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If anybody had the reach and brand needed to carve out a place in apps markets in competition with Apple and Google, Adobe would have looked like a good candidate. Instead, it’s abandoning the field of battle, announcing that it will close down both the Air Marketplace and InMarket. Instead, the company says it will help developers publish to multiple platforms and application markets.

While Adobe Air has become something of a must-have at least among Twitterers using TweetDeck, the platform’s has struggled to attract developers – at the time of writing, only around 1,500 apps are listed on the Air Marketplace.

The close-down also affects InMarket developers who had also published to the Intel AppUp centre, with Intel to take over those relationships.

While it hasn’t explained the decision in any detail, it says “developer feedback” drove the decision – presumably, this means “why should we work with a small app store when we can work with a big one?”

Adobe hints at as much, saying that “there are now several app stores on desktops, mobile devices and tablets that service AIR developers including Apple App Store, Android Market, BlackBerry AppWorld, Intel AppUp centre, Samsung Apps and Toshiba App Place”.

Developers who have their apps hosted at InMarket have until August 31 to find a new host for their apps, and to update their pointers. ®